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Apple’s A-series smartphone processors have evolved significantly from the A7 (28nm) to the A18 Pro (3nm), gaining more cores, transistors and features. With each new node, TSMC charged Apple more per chip, so the price rose from $5,000 for a 28nm chip with the A7 processors to $18,000 for a 3nm chip for the A17 and A18 series processors, according to reports. Ben BajarinCEO and Principal Analyst at Creative Strategies.
Bajarin points out that with the development of Apple’s A-series chips, the number of transistors has constantly increased, starting from one billion in the A7 and reaching 20 billion in the A18 Pro. This makes sense because the number of cores and features has also increased: in 2013, the A7 features two high-performance cores and a quad-cluster GPU, while in 2024, the A18 Pro features two high-performance cores and four power cores. Efficient cores, a 16-core NPU, and a six-core GPU.
Got a detailed price/die/density analysis of Apple A-silicon over time at TSMC. Some nuggets. From A7 to A18: – Progress from 28nm to 3nm – The most dramatic contraction occurred early (28nm → 20nm → 16nm / 14nm) – Steady increase in transistor count from 1 billion (A7) to 20…December 18, 2024
The A-series processors are aimed at smartphones, and Bajarin says their die sizes have remained relatively constant, ranging between 80 and 125 square millimeters across generations. This has been achieved through a steady increase in transistor densities facilitated by TSMC’s latest processing technologies.
The most significant increases in transistor density occurred in the previous decades, such as shifts from 28nm to 20nm and then to 16nm/14nm. However, newer processing techniques (N5, N4P, N3B, N3E) show slower improvements in density. The peak period of transistor density improvements occurred around A11 (N10 class, 10 nm) and A12 (N7 class, 7 nm), with gains of 86% and 69%, respectively. Recent chips, including the A16 to A18 Pro, show a noticeable slowdown in density progression, mainly due to slower SRAM scaling.
However, despite diminishing returns, Bajarin points out that production costs have risen sharply. Chip prices rose from $5,000 for the A7 to $18,000 for the A17 and A18 Pro, while the cost per square millimeter increased from $0.07 to $0.25.
Bajarin says his information comes from a third-party supply chain report, and the company that produced it has sources at TSMC. Bajarin also triangulated some factors through his own sources. Overall, TSMC pricing seems listed More or less consistent With previous reports, though we should always take unofficial information with a grain of salt.
To make matters more difficult for Apple, performance increases have also slowed with its latest processor generations (with the exception of the A18 and M4 series) as it has become more difficult to extract higher instruction-per-cycle (IPC) throughput with the latest architectures. However, Apple has managed to maintain performance gains per watt with each generation.
“Because IPC gains are difficult to achieve, but getting efficiencies where possible even if their costs are associated with increased space, is a viable performance-per-watt strategy,” Bajarin told Tom’s Hardware.
According to well-cited industry reports, TSMC always sells chips with salable and non-salable dies to its customers, not just salable dies. Therefore, the number of chips derived from a wafer depends on the manufacturing yield. Higher throughput produces more chips per wafer, while lower throughput produces fewer. This yield-based variance impacts the cost effectiveness of chips for customers. However, there is an important part here: TSMC guarantees that it will try to achieve a certain production target before starting production.
If the actual yield falls by a large margin, such as 10% to 15%, TSMC may offer financial compensation or rebates to affected customers. These terms are intended to reassure customers about TSMC’s reliability and the value of its high-cost chips.
Being an Alpha customer for the latest process technologies, Apple has the opportunity to fine-tune its manufacturing processes to reduce defect density and increase its productivity, so the company is in a better position from a cost perspective compared to other TSMC customers. Apple is also rumored to be the only TSMC customer that pays TSMC on a per-chip, not per-chip basis. If true, this sets Apple apart from other TSMC clients.
